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PRINTTALK
ADOPTS MEMBERSHIP AGREEMENT, ELECTS OFFICERS, FORMS WORKING GROUPS
Founding members of the PrintTalk project to define a "best practice"
common and open communications interface between their products adopted
a membership agreement and operating procedures, elected officers and
formed Technical, Marketing and Intellectual Property Working Groups at
a meeting July 14 in Denver, Colorado.
The PrintTalk implementation will support use of the proposed Job Definition Format (JDF) standard for its job specification semantic and Commercial eXtensible Markup Language (cXML) to define the business objects. As part of the group’s activities, it will seek to have its work recognized as an implementation of the proposed JDF standard by submitting the PrintTalk implementation to CIP4 for inclusion in its specification. The PrintTalk interface specification will be distributed free of any license fees or royalties, in order to address the need for end-to-end connectivity in the printing industry.
Nineteen print management system and e-commerce companies are participating in the activity as founding members. PrintTalk does not currently intend to operate as a standards body, but instead will function as a community of concerned vendors focused on implementing interoperable systems.
Acting Chairman Stephen J. Hallberg, President of Parsec Corporation, was elected President of PrintTalk. James Mekis, Director, Commercial Print Solutions of Impresse Corporation, was elected Vice President.
The group approved a membership agreement that opens participation in PrintTalk to any company which develops software for graphic arts applications and which supports implementation of the JDF standard and an open communications interface between products.
Regular members commit to (1) the purposes of PrintTalk, (2) first deployment of the PrintTalk implementation on the member’s computer system or separate product within six months of joining, (3) supporting the current PrintTalk implementation as a standard component in subsequent software releases, (4) willingness to execute the current form of the membership agreement, (5) active participation in meetings and working groups and (6) public endorsement of PrintTalk’s purpose, scope and timeframe in the form of a press release within 14 calendar days of joining.
Additional companies that develop software for graphic arts may be accepted as supporters, providing they commit to all criteria for regular members except deployment within six months.
The group formed Technical, Marketing and Intellectual Property Working Groups to deal with such issues as determining the requirements for conformance with the implementation and a process to certify compliance. Individuals were appointed to serve as liaison with related activities in the industry.
Founding members of PrintTalk include Avanti Computer Systems, Cirqit.com, Collabria, Inc., Graphic Arts IT, GraphiTech Computer Systems, httprint, Impresse, MediaFlex.com, MicroInk, Noosh, Inc., Pace Systems, Parsec Corporation, Press-tige Software, Printable.com, printChannel.com, Printers Software, Inc., Profit Control Systems, Inc., Streamline Solutions and WAM!NET.
Broad interest in the work of PrintTalk is developing in the industry beyond the member companies. "We are encouraged to see efforts like PrintTalk implementing and supporting JDF within an e-commerce and web-based workflow or project management paradigm," said Paul Beyer, Group Product Manager for Adobe Systems’ Professional Publishing Group.
"The industry is coalescing around JDF and is beginning to provide implementations which will offer true interoperability and automation between related systems," he said.
NPES The Association for Suppliers of Printing, Publishing and Converting Technologies is serving as secretariat to PrintTalk, with NPES Vice President William K. Smythe as administrator.
NPES is a U.S. trade association representing more than 450 companies engaged in manufacturing and importing for sale or distribution of machinery, equipment, systems, software and supplies used in every printing, publishing and converting process from desktop design and image generation and processing to multiple output options and targeted dissemination systems. Information about NPES, its programs and its member companies is available on the Association web site at http://www.npes.org.
The Association serves as secretariat to the following standards activities: The American National Standards Institute accredited B65Committee, charged with the development of safety standards for printing and finishing equipment; the ANSI accredited Committee for Graphic Arts Technologies Standards (CGATS) to support and foster graphic arts standards activities and the develop technical standards where no applicable developer is available; the U.S. Technical Advisory Group to the International Organization for Standardization’s Technical Committee 130, Graphic Technology, responsible for coordinating the U.S. position and participation in the international standards activities of the ISO’s TC 130.
NPES also administers the International Color Consortium, an organization with nearly 75 members devoted to developing a specification to enable different computer platforms and devices to translate color definition information into a standard color interchange space so that the receiving device can interpret that data into the appropriate color.